


To Secure Souls For Our Master

by LMT



Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: Attempted h/c, Crowley's good at healing, Gen, Hell doesn't budget miracles very carefully
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-30
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:01:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,077
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21556681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LMT/pseuds/LMT
Summary: It seems to me there are more direct ways of securing souls for the master than nudging people towards one sin at a time and hoping they eventually fall into damnation by accident.This is about Crowley getting his job done, in spite of the interference of a certain fussy little angel.
Comments: 14
Kudos: 46





	1. Chapter 1

**A/N: This was going to be light when I started, but then it went and got dark on me somehow. Some people get a happy ending, but be warned, there’s a baby who doesn’t make it. Sorry about that.**

* * *

The sight of a ruined church was always upsetting, but this one was nothing short of disaster. It was a church that had collapsed less than an hour ago, during a baptismal mass, and the screams and tears of the wounded and bereaved had not yet started to abate.

Walking among the humans was a figure all in black. Flame-red hair. Aziraphale recognized him instantly, even before getting a wave of greeting, and he stormed over to grab him by the shoulder.

“Crowley! This is your work?”

“Yeah, obviously,” he said, absent and without turning. “Give me a hand?”

“A _hand_? How could you-? Crowley, a _church_! How could you?”

“What?” Finally he looked. Saw the disbelieving anger, the gesture towards-

“ _That_? The building? Oh no, no no no. Come _on._ ” He shook his head. “I don’t need to get smited. Smitten? Smote. Whatever, don’t need it; this was the work of, I don’t know, ants or termites or something. God’s creatures. Take it up with Her.”

Aziraphale calmed down – he believed; large-scale murder was really not Crowley’s way. He looked around then, more carefully. “But then what are you doing here?”

“I was in the neighborhood.” He cocked his head. “I meant it though: could use a hand. Hm?”

“A hand with what?”

“Them.” Crowley sniffed. He gestured around at the noisy, dirty humans with one hand-… and, with the other, wiped a trickle of blood from his nose.

_That_ was odd; demons didn’t ordinarily walk around bleeding. The light glinted off the sleeve he’d used; it was blacker than black; the whole thing was _wet_. Aziraphale reached out and touched it gingerly. “Is that yours?”

“Ah… not all of it, probably.” Crowley nodded towards the people. “Come on – let’s get this done, I’m tired.” He beckoned to a woman with a whimpering child in her arms. “Let me see. Okay.” He took a deep breath, lay his hand on the child’s forehead, and hissed a few words. The child stilled. He grasped the child’s foot, which had been hanging at an odd angle, and straightened it with a puff of smoke.

“You’re _healing_ everybody?” He was aghast all over again. “Are you out of your mind! What are you _doing_?” Aziraphale grabbed at him, trying to take him aside for privacy where the humans wouldn’t crowd them. But Crowley wouldn’t move. “You can’t just walk around healing people willy-nilly!”

“Why not?” Crowley looked quite exhausted, and bleeding again, but he seemed amused. “My side really doesn’t budget miracles that strictly, and I’ve had a slow couple of decades, so I can actually-”

“And this was a _church,_ ” he hissed. “These people are, are, are pious and Godfearing! They don’t need _your_ interference.”

“These people _were_ pious and Godfearing.” Crowley glanced over at the ruins. “But God just went and dropped a building on their heads, didn’t She.” Aziraphale didn’t answer. _Now,_ finally, this was starting to make sense. “I’d say a lot of these people are about ready to consider some alternatives. Especially the kids, kids are always smarter. _I_ would, if I were them. Especially if I saw _me_ doing me favors.”

It made _sense,_ but it was cheating. Illegal. “You may have a blanket permission to go throwing miracles around in general,” he said, nose in the air, “But I _know_ you are prohibited from identifying yourself to people as a demon of Hell when you work wonders. It confuses them. It’s not allowed.”

Crowley smiled at him. Reached out and pinched his cheek. “I don’t have to identify myself at all, angel – you’ve just saved me the trouble. Thank you.” He turned back to the humans and cracked his knuckles. “Now: who’s next?”

A boy – maybe twelve or thirteen – stepped up, but warily. “You’re a demon?”

Crowley heaved a sigh and looked heavenward. Put a finger to his lips, as if to indicate secrecy. Nodded.

“So will I be damned if you touch me?”

The boy’s uncertainty was permission enough, apparently; he approached even while answering. “No, not necessarily. That’ll be up to you. Close your eyes, this will spark.” He closed a gash on the boy’s face. Moved on to the next, a girl writhing weakly on the ground.

But the boy knelt too, continued to tag after him. “What do you mean, _up to me_?”

“I _mean,_ ” Crowley said, busy feeling the girl over, “That while I’ll tell you Hell is frankly better than _Up There_ in a couple of very important ways even though it’s _really_ no picnic in others... I don’t make your choice for you.”

“Choice? Oh. So... if I wanted to-... to...?”

Crowley paused and fixed him with a serious look. “Then you reject the Almighty and you don’t change your mind about it on your deathbed. That’s it.”

“That’s it?” The boy reared back, suspicious. “I don’t have to… pray to Satan? And do evil all my life?”

“Nope. I mean you can if you want to,” he added, “It’s always appreciated. But all you actually _have_ to do to get below is to reject the Upstairs. Now back up. You’re covered in holy rubble and I’m going to pass out if I keep breathing it in.”

He turned back to what he was doing. Helping a crushed girl to walk again.

Meanwhile, the boy was approaching Aziraphale. “So he’s a demon. And you’re an angel?”

It wasn’t nearly as frowned upon to confirm a human’s correct guess as it was to ostentatiously announce yourself, so, he went ahead and admitted it. “I am.”

“Then why don’t you help too? They’re still trying to get people out from under the beams. Come lift them.”

“Um.” Aziraphale swallowed. It sounded like something Crowley might say. _Tempting an angel to disobey his heavenly orders,_ he thought. _I think we’ve lost this one already._ “I… have a lot of sympathy for people suffering hardship,” he said as gently as he could, “But that’s not allowed. I’m not allowed to just… run around fixing everything.”

“I am,” Crowley said, as he righted the crushed girl to stand on her miraculously de-crushed legs. “I can do whatever I want. Hold her still, dear,” he said to a weeping woman holding an infant. “This won’t hurt her. I’ll just- _AH_!” He roared and flinched away.

“Crowley?” Aziraphale took half a panicked step towards him before he got himself under control. “Are you all right?”

“Yes I just- I can’t-…” he winced in the baby’s general direction and leaned towards it – from a safe distance. “What in the heaven is the matter with that baby?” he said. Then his eyes widened. “Oh – it’s the one they were baptizing.”

The crying woman nodded. Tried again to hold it out.

“Sorry, I can’t-… touch it.” Crowley backed away. “I would if I could, I love babies, but… yours has been doused in holy water. I can’t.”

“Please?” the woman advanced on him. “She hit her head. She’s breathing but- I can see- oh-…”

“Yeah, no, that’s-… that’s skull right there, it’s… I’m sorry, look, I really can’t. She’ll be…immune to me.” He reached out, still backing away, and his fingers started to smoke when the child came close.

The woman clutched the baby to her chest and _wailed_. 

Crowley looked over. “Aziraphale.”

“Crowley, you know I _can’t_.”

The demon hissed – impatient. “Yes I know. I’m not trying to tempt you into breaking any _rules,_ Satan forbid.” He rolled his eyes. “Just come give it grace. Make sure it gets up there safe – my infernal fingerprints are all over here and I don’t want any mix-ups. Hell is no place for babies.”

Dying children were not his forte. But Crowley was right; that much at least he could do. He came closer and touched the baby on its broken head.

Good thing, too; he could tell immediately that the baptism hadn’t been completed and Crowley’s demonic energies really _were_ thick in the air. He took care of it, blessed the baby to fast-track its journey upward, and gave it a peaceful sleep without pain.

Crowley hung over his shoulder, watching him work. “I don’t think she’ll wake again,” he said heavily. “ _Bastards._ Why during a baptism? Why the baby?”

He just shook his head, just as heavily. _Those are the kinds of questions that got you into trouble in the first place._

But before the demon could spiral too far, the boy who had talked to him was approaching again. “Excuse me. Over here – help my friend. I dusted him off so there won’t be bits of pew or bible or anything on him. Come on.”

Crowley allowed himself to be tugged along and directed like a servant. No longer boisterous and defiant, no longer having fun, but he went on healing until exhaustion, until he was bleeding steadily and had to sit down. He was reeking of burning brimstone because the heap of debris he had collapsed on was _consecrated_ debris, but still he laid hands on the people who were brought to him and mulishly refused to abandon the field until Aziraphale at last removed him by force.

(That miracle, at least, should not be complained of by Anyone. He had banished a demon from a holy site. Nobody could find fault with _that_.)

(Nor could they find fault with him manifesting a tub and hot bathwater. The dirt of the disaster was all over him. As well as all over the guest he was not ever going to tell anybody about.)

* * *

**The End.**

**Sorry this turned out dark. I just liked the idea of Crowley pretending that he’s doing something for demonic recruitment purposes, when really he starts it because he’s nice, and finishes because he’s too stubborn and pissed-off to quit. Let me know what you thought!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Okay, it was _supposed_ to be a one-shot, but summerartist made me think about what happens next, so. Here’s what happens next.**

* * *

Two hours later, the demon awoke with a start. “It’s all right,” Aziraphale assured him immediately, in case the fact that he was resting on soft cushions in a quiet place wasn’t assurance enough. “It’s just me, you’re safe here.”

“I’m-. What happened, I-. _Ugh._ ” The words were swallowed by a deep groan when he tried to move.

“You’re exhausted.”

Crowley sank back down and covered his face with an arm. Was bright light uncomfortable for him? But he’d never before- “Smiting tends to do that to us, yes.” He uncovered and propped himself up on an elbow. “I cannot believe you smited me, Aziraphale. Smote. Whatever. After all these years? I don’t really think it was called for _now_ , when I was just-”

“What are you talking about?” he snapped over him. “I didn’t smite you.” Technically, perhaps, banishing a demon against his will might qualify as a smiting, but since in this case he’d actually been performing more of a rescue, he thought it was hardly a fair complaint.

“Course not.” Crowley pushed himself up to his hands and knees, then rose to his full height so slowly that Aziraphale was tempted to go and help him. Didn’t, though. No sense getting too close to a grouchy demon, even one that you were generally on pleasant terms with. “I wake up like this all the time.”

He shimmered and let himself show – something he had only done a handful of times in all their centuries of meetings. And when he had, he’d never looked like _this_. Flesh and feathers were burned away, cold starlight and red raw insides were showing, and Aziraphale flinched away from the sight for more reasons than just the usual aversion to demonic ugliness in its undisguised form.

“All right, all right, I see, I believe you,” he said irritably. “Now put your... your skin back on, will you? You can’t walk around like that, imagine if someone came in.”

Crowley arranged himself back into his favored shape, where the damage was invisible. “I’d eat ‘em.”

“Oh, of course you would,” he huffed. Then addressed him more seriously. “I do apologize though. If the force was excessive.” _I was only trying to help. I was worried about you._ But he couldn’t say that aloud.

“Mm. S’alright. Head office’ll love it. I’ll probably get a medal.”

There was no mirth in the smile, and Aziraphale felt a little uneasy suddenly. “Crowley – truly. I’m sorry.” Casting around for something more concrete to offer, his eyes fell on the bathtub he’d created and he gestured to it. “There – for you. Go on.”

Crowley turned to follow his gesture. And then all Hell broke loose.

Wings. The demon’s wings erupted, and even charred and damaged as they were they still filled the whole room, cleared shelves, broke windows. And he _roared_ , savagely, his face twisted with hate. 

“What-?” Aziraphale couldn’t even find words.

“ _Fuck yourself!_ ” he snarled. “You didn’t have the courage to do it while I was asleep, is that it? Think I’ll spare you the job and jump in, if you just ask me nicely enough? Is that it?”

“What? What are you-”

“ _You think I’ll go down without a fight just because I **like** you?_”

“Crowley, I have no idea what you’re talking about!” He found himself shouting. “Crowley!” He couldn’t remember the last time he’d raised his voice like this, but his panic and confusion were getting the better of him.

Crowley was backing into a corner, crouched like an animal under threat. It made no sense.

Until his yellow eyes flashed to the bathtub and his hackles rose even further.

_Oh._

Aziraphale understood all at once. “Oh, Crowley, _no_.” Compassion swept over him so hard it hurt. “Of course not.” He advanced steadily, all ready to take the demon’s hands in his and soothe him by main force. “Please, you can’t think-” 

“ _Stay away!_ ” The dark wings beat hard. “One more step and so help me _I’ll gut you_.” His speech was hardly intelligible through the fangs he’d sprouted.

 _You couldn’t gut a kitten, the state you’re in._ But he swallowed that down in time; it wasn’t kind. And really... it wasn’t even the whole story. _You couldn’t gut me **ever** ,_ he knew, _no matter how strong you were, because it’s just not **you.**_

He stopped and held his hands up, harmless. “Crowley, I am not going to hurt you. I swear it. You’ve misunderstood me.”

The demon’s gaze moved from his face to the tub and back again.

“That’s just water. Just a bath, for all the blood and dirt. That’s all. I promise. I just thought you might want a bath.”

Crowley still didn’t move.

“I’ll get rid of it if you want. Do you want me to get rid of it?”

At that Crowley licked his lips – several times, and with a forked tongue. Finally the fangs were gone and he could talk clearly again. “It’s not... It isn’t holy water?”

“ _No._ I swear to you by all I hold dear.” _How could you think that?_

But he _should_ think it, it _should_ be holy water, and Aziraphale was momentarily dizzy with the utter wrongness of this all. Here he was, offering reassurance to a demon, swearing not to do the very thing that he should in fact be doing.

“Really?” Crowley still sounded tense and hoarse and terrible, and his discomfort with the wrongness melted away in favor of that much more important problem.

“Really. Please calm down. I’m sorry I frightened you.”

“You didn’t-...” The denial only made it halfway out before Crowley was laughing harshly over it. “Fuck it, of course you did. Sorry. I’m just tired I guess, not thinking straight. I’m sorry about your-... things.” He folded his wings away, and another picture fell off the wall.

But he still didn’t come out of his corner.

Mindful of the threat that still stood between them, outlandish as it was, Aziraphale didn’t come any closer. In fact he moved away, picked his book back up from the floor, and resumed the seat where he’d been keeping vigil. “Well. It’s there if you want it,” he said as calmly as he could. “You really are filthy.”

It took Crowley a little more time to regain possession of himself, but when he did he flounced by as if none of it had ever happened. “Oh go on, call me names,” he said. “You’re just jealous that I grabbed probably twenty people this afternoon, right from under your nose.”

“You didn’t _grab_ anyone,” he said, without looking up from his book. Relieved to fall back into their usual friendly bickering. “The humans make their own choices.”

“Mm. I wonder what _utter genius_ is responsible for giving them that power.”

Now he did look up. Crowley was standing beside the tub, unclothed, but still hanging back as if he couldn’t _quite_ find the nerve to proceed.

So Aziraphale soaked him with a massive splash, without leaving his seat. “A filthy one,” he said coolly, pretending he didn’t see any flinch. “Now get in.”

* * *

**The End.**

**Okay, that’s really it this time.**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Why do I even act like I have any control over how long stories are going to be?**

* * *

_Aziraphale really needs a win._ That was his first thought, when he saw the angel drop down out of the clouds, soaked and buffeted by winds and dodging a particularly fancy bolt of lightning. _If he’s gotten off his soft little ass and physically flown halfway across the ocean directly into a demonic thunderstorm for the sake of saving three tiny little ships... he really needs a win._

He flew closer himself so that they could hear each other over the gale. “What are you doing here?” he shouted. “Have you been following me?” It made no sense – they hadn’t spoken in close to two hundred years. Not since that dreadful church collapse where Aziraphale had seen fit to pull him apart and then terrify him with mock execution (which he insisted was an accident, but Crowley had his doubts.).

Aziraphale shaded his eyes with his hand and tried to blink through the rain. “No,” he shouted back. “I’m following _them_.” He pointed down to the ships.

He hovered so close that their wings were in danger of tangling, but there was no other way to be heard in this weather. “ _Them_?” Crowley looked. Then his jaw dropped as he understood. “It’s- it’s _your_ fault they’re here!” he shrieked. 

“They’re _meant_ to be here-”

“No they’re meant _not_ to be here, because _I sent them to **India**! _They’re going the wrong way!”

“India? That was _you_?” The angel looked just as dumbfounded. “I- I should have known!”

They stared at each other. “Fuck,” Crowley said at last. “You’d think the bosses would _tell_ us, when we’re directly...? Fuck.”

The angel seemed to have no idea what to do either. “So this is your storm?”

He nodded.

“Will you stop it?”

He shook his head. “Sorry, angel. I’ve got orders.”

“So do I.”

He pointed. “They’re not to reach the New World.”

“They are.”

“ _Fuck._ ”

They stared at each other again. “Why?” Aziraphale asked at last. “Why would Hell care?”

“Same reason your lot does, I suppose.” He coughed some rain out of his lungs. “Lot of souls over there. The Almighty getting a foot in the door. Yeah?”

“Yes. Same.”

Crowley wondered if he looked as miserable as the angel did. Neither of them were really great lovers of the extreme outdoors. “Well, what do we do?”

The angel squared up – as close as he ever came to a warlike posture, and it wasn’t very close, all waterlogged like this. “What we’re meant to: you try to sink the ships, and I try to save them.”

“I’ll win.” He grinned. “They gave me power like you wouldn’t believe for this. If we get into it, this time _I’ll_ be the one melting _your_ aspects off.” _And you’ll wake hanging upside down over a firepit. Fun!_

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Good is always- _AAH_!”

His scream was drowned out by thunder, as a bolt of lightning singed his feathers. Crowley reached out and caught him by the arm to steady him before he tumbled. Grinning. “Told you. You’re tired already, and I’m just warming up.”

Aziraphale pulled free. “Stop this weather and let them go.” The white wings shined, even through the dark of the storm. Blasted celestial _light,_ so annoyingly _holy_. Crowley wished passionately to dislike it, but he didn’t.

“Can’t.”

“Crowley.” Now _he_ reached out, fumbling to take hold, as if touch would do what puppy-eyes couldn’t. “You don’t want to do this. You’re really going to just kill all these people?”

He didn’t _love_ it, but orders were orders – and these actually were not very bad orders, in context. “Do you have any idea what _they’re_ going to do, to the natives, when they get there?”

Of course he did; they both knew; _everyone_ knew. And he’d thought the angel would at least have the decency to look uncomfortable, to look away, the way he usually did when the Great Blasted Plan wrought devastation. But instead Aziraphale squeezed his arm and said: “What they’re going to do is to make their own choices, I imagine. Thanks to _someone_.”

It took him too long to answer – Aziraphale had time to keep going. “Heaven is _going_ to get its message to the New World,” he said with certainty. “The only question is whether or not I survive to see it. If you discorporate me and sink those ships, there will be others.”

“You’ll make me discorporate you for this? Really?”

“Really. This is important. If it weren’t, I’d-.” He stopped.

“You’d what? You’d stand down?”

Aziraphale wiped at his face. “But it _is_ important. So I can’t.”

For about half a second he imagined doing it, blowing the angel right out of the sky. But he couldn’t. Not to someone who was almost, sort of, a friend. (Not that he _had_ any friends, of course. But almost.).

He wondered whether he could explain this away. _I changed my mind,_ he’d say, _because in the end I figured these bunglers will alienate the entire continent, they’ll recruit better for us than we could ever-_ No. It was a good explanation, he could almost believe it himself, but this time he’d not been given any room to change his mind. His orders were clear: stop those ships, Or Else.

He pulled away to a distance that might be survivable. “Make it a good one,” he called, dull. Couldn’t even find it in him to joke. “From behind, like you snuck up on me.”

He turned his back. Cursed the New World and everyone who wanted a piece of it. Hated himself for being so soft. Promised himself that Aziraphale would regret this someday, and waited for the blast.

* * *

**The End - possibly?**

**Okay so securing souls for the master is complicated by being friends with one of the master’s enemies. I think there may be another part to this somewhere. I kind of have something kicking around my head where they’re in a hospital talking about someone who needs an organ, and they find each other’s proposed solutions totally horrifying. Not sure that belongs with this story, but it might. Stay tuned! And let me know what you think so far…**


	4. Chapter 4

It took a long time to get home.

When he reached it at last he found his lair warm and lit, with a pot of soup steaming on the table. He glared at it and crawled into bed.

When he awoke the soup was still there – and still steaming. He wondered how long it had been there, and whether it would steam _forever_ or only until the angel forgot about him. He went back to sleep.

The second time he woke up, he was too hungry to keep sulking – he dragged himself over to the table and drank the entire pot down.

Not ten seconds later – right in the middle of his post-soup burp, in fact – there was a knock at his door.

“Go away!”

The door opened. Aziraphale stood in the doorway looking guilty. “You _look_ all right, at least?” he hazarded.

Crowley opted not to show him; he didn’t quite want to think about it. But he couldn’t help snarling a little. “You know it doesn’t _actually_ hurt less when you spare the corporation, don’t you?”

“I know. I’m sorry.” The angel stepped in, uninvited, mincing carefully over the pile of papers that had been building up in front of the door. “Can I do anything for you?”

“You can go away.” Then he jerked his head to point. “But pick those up for me first, will you?”

“Hm? Oh, of course.” Aziraphale bent. “What is all this?”

“Orders. When I don’t answer they just shove ‘em under the door.”

The angel started _looking_ at them, as he stacked them up. “Italy…London… the high seas…” He sounded more and more disapproving. “You can’t actually be expected to _go_ all these places!”

“Mm. Give me.” He held his hand out, impatient.

“Crowley. You need to _heal_.”

“And you need to go away. No one asked you,” he added. “Just give me those, I’ll take care of them. It’s better than the alternative.”

“Crowley.” He held on to the papers.

Crowley laughed. “What, are you going to do them for me?”

 _That,_ of course, made the angel cooperate in a hurry. “No no, please,” he said, handing the stack over like it might burn him. “As badly as I feel, and I _do_ , I am not going to stoop to doing _evil_ for you.”

“Oh, it’s not _evil._ ” Waving it off like the stupidest thing he’d ever heard… until his eyes fell on the top page and it said _Set fire to the widow’s-_ “At least not always.” He shuffled the papers, tucking that one away, and held up a better assignment. “See, here I’m just tempting a young man to set aside his betrothed and take a different one. Ooh, and it’s a girl with loose morals, this should be _fun_!” He set the papers down and propped his elbows on the table. “Growing _our_ side at the expense of _yours_ takes all kinds of acts. Soon as I’m up and about, I’ll start with that one.”

“Let me see.” Aziraphale snatched the page and looked it over. “Fine. I’ll do it for you. You take a rest.”

He felt his jaw drop. 

“You always say it doesn’t matter _how_ our assignments get done, don’t you?” the angel snapped, as if he had argued.

“Well it _doesn’t_ , but…”

“Then I’ll do this without harming anybody, and I’ll write out a completely exaggerated and self-congratulatory report the way _you_ always do, in that awful handwriting, and I’ll file it.”

“You’ll file for me?” Somehow that was even harder to imagine than Aziraphale doing the actual temptation.

The angel sniffed. “I’ve watched you conjure your circles, I know how.” His face showed nothing but irritation, stress, and mild affront. “It’s safer than me returning here afterwards anyway. The less often we meet, the less likely it is that someone will notice we’re-. Meeting.”

 _What **were** you going to say there, angel?_ He wanted to ask. If he’d had just a _little_ more energy tonight, he would have. “Can’t argue with that,” he said at last, instead.

Aziraphale eyed the pile. “And I’ll take one more,” he decided. “So that Hell stays out of your hair long enough for you to get better. Go on, pick one.”

Crowley looked back down at the stack of orders and paged through them. It felt strangely personal, picking out a task for the angel to go fulfill. But the light was poor, and hopefully his blush would go unnoticed. “Here,” he said at last. “You can teach a couple of idiots to play dice. Give them a taste for it.”

He took the paper. “The hope being, I take it, that they fall prey to an obsession with gambling, and lose everything they hold dear?”

 _No. The hope being that **nothing** bad happens to them at all, and then they spread the vice throughout their village, and then **dozens** of people fall prey to an obsession with gambling and lose everything they hold dear._ “Something like that, I guess.”

“Well.” Aziraphale stuck his nose in the air. “If they should make ill use of the knowledge I give them that will be on their own heads. Yes: I’ll teach these people dice. That’s not so bad.”

Crowley tried not to smile. _Underneath it all you and I are exactly the same,_ he thought, and tried to make the thought feel gloating rather than affectionate.

“Thanks,” he said, as he made his way back to the bed. “I’ll pay you back someday. I know you get a lot of garbage assignments too.”

There was a moment of silence, and Crowley rethought his offer and braced himself for a disgusted _no thank you._

But instead, at last, the angel spoke up and said: “Crowley.”

“Hm?” he turned.

“I’d like that,” Aziraphale said warmly, with a wide angelic smile. “I would really like to see you do something _good_ , openly and all the way for once. I know that you-…” the smile faded and he looked quickly heavenward, as if to make sure there was nobody listening from the ceiling. “Well. You know what I know.”

 _Oh, yes, practically say it all out loud, why don’t you._ Suddenly he was full of much more nerves than affection. “I know that you know how to conjure my circles,” he said frostily. “At least you’d better, because if you get me in trouble for this, angel, I promise I’ll find you and rip your tongue out with my teeth. Just try to play around with mortal food _then_.” He got into bed without making any more eye contact, without giving any more smiles.

But the angel was undeterred. “Sleep well, demon.”

“Mmph.”

* * *

**The End?**

**Tee-hee, it’s an explanation for the Arrangement. But I don't know if this is the end or not. I have no clue.**


End file.
